


FIRECRACKER

by orphan_account



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Celebrity, Flashbacks, Fluff and Humour, Idiots in Love, Idol and Manager, M/M, Miscommunication, Mutual Pining, Na Jaemin is a Brat, Retrospective
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-23
Updated: 2019-07-23
Packaged: 2020-07-08 03:17:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19862629
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Sometimes it was hard being the manager of someone so fucking unruly. Na Jaemin was something like a firecracker, so brilliant and beautiful and born for greatness and Donghyuck couldn’t help but feel like a fizzle of spark next to him sometimes, especially when he felt Jaemin wriggle out of his metaphorical grip and trail blaze the sky on his own terms — but he didn’t mind. Not as much as he let on.OR: Jaemin hasn't got thetimeto fall in love. Not when he's babysitting the nation's brat.





	FIRECRACKER

**Author's Note:**

> **PROMPT:** N-110 — Donghyuck is idol Jaemin's exasperated manager, and tries not to fall in love with him in the process. Jaemin's been an idol since he was like seventeen, and Donghyuck was assigned as his manager and they've been together for years and Donghyuck is infamous around the industry for being the only manager that can handle an insufferable Jaemin.
> 
>  **TO THE REQUESTER:** i genuinely wish i had more time to turn this into the slowest of burn it deserved and evolve this way more but!!!! loved the prompt and i really hope you enjoy the finished product in turn :( #bratjaem2019

“I’m not doing it,” Jaemin says primly, one leg crossed over the other and flicking a thumb up his phone screen in the dressing room. 

There’s an awkward, but weirdly familiar tension laid over the rest of the beauty and coordi team like a blanket, as Donghyuck stares down at him with barely contained irritation, eyes only leaving him to nervously look at the clock and how they were five minutes late to the beginning of filming. He breathes in once, twice; braces his hand on the chair that Jaemin’s perched on’s arm before bending down to bring his face a little closer to his charge.

“Jaem, you realise that if you don’t do this, you’ll completely lose the CF deal, right?”

Jaemin peers up at that, thumb stilling. 

“But the script is a complete joke,” he tries again, a little weaker but still adamant, wilting under Donghyuck’s stony gaze. Donghyuck only barely represses an urge to roll his eyes back into his head, lost forever and rattling around his skull. He’d need new eyes. Can’t afford those on manager pay. “You know that, right? I mean, a weird love story formed over the facial benefits Innisfree skincare? Am I twelve or something?”

“This is one of the only ways the GP can see a different side to you,” he huffs back, tapping his index finger on the polished wood of the chair in tune to his voice, not too unlike the ones used in those classic Hollywood shoots. 

“Innocent, fresh love,” he continues, recalling the words he remembered from the initial briefing of the CF shooting two weeks back, words drilled into the head of both Donghyuck and the other agency representative, “is the easiest pull for non-fans. It’s a minute-long advert, on the prime channels everywhere. I’m sure you can get over it.”

Jaemin must not like Donghyuck’s tone, proven when he narrows his eyes and leans in a little closer himself, phone dropped and forgotten in his lap. He grips the arms of his chair like he’s about to push off and front on Donghyuck, fingers brushing the other boy’s. Donghyuck refuses to react, doesn’t allow his expression to twitch.

“‘Get over it’?” Jaemin hisses, a little quieter so it can only be heard between them, despite the rest of his team deliberately listening in with their weird, supersonic bat hearing brought about by an intense need to know drama. “I tell you I don’t like something and you tell me to get over it?”

Donghyuck snorts, but he feels his own annoyance prickle at him for his choice of words. Could’ve gone about that a little better.

“Okay, Jaemin. Would you like me to tell you the real reason why you’re bothered by this?”

“Oh, do tell.”

“It’s because you’re still bothered by the Berry Love girl thing,” Donghyuck says pointedly, barrelling on before he can stop. Regardless, he’s more cautious though touching on this subject though, acting like he wasn’t up for 46 hours when this was happening — hardwired to carry on through triple-shot coffee, of course — in meetings and briefings and coaxing Jaemin down from the metaphorical ledge of career death, “and you know what? That’s okay. It was _fucked._ I’m still angry too, and if I had my way you wouldn’t be doing it with this other girl because you’re obviously uncomfortable and your well-being comes first overall, right? But… Kang Jihyun wasn’t the one who lied, Jaem. It wasn’t her fault.”

A marring of something crosses over Jaemin’s face, something Donghyuck tracks with a slightly shaky gaze. Despite the years they’d spent together, despite how Donghyuck knew Jaemin like a shed exoskeleton, like a twin, there were some parts Donghyuck wasn’t as confident on. What he really meant, how he was really feeling, what he was really thinking. It bothered him more than he was willing to admit, because frankly, Donghyuck spent half of his time around him wanting to open him up, to see how he ticked, breathed. 

They’re both quiet for a few beats, and Donghyuck almost pulls back out of his face to apologise if he stepped too far in front of so many people, until Jaemin lets out a sigh himself. 

“You’re right, whatever,” he says, a little too blasé. He’s quite clearly still bothered if the mildly pinched look on his face is anything to go by, and Donghyuck honestly wishes deep in his heart that they could still withdraw from the commercial. Sure, it’s ground-level exposure to his brand, and Innisfree were big, but what happened to Jaemin was a _lot,_ for his profession and emotionally, too. 

He didn’t even know who else was going to be featuring on it with him until the confirmation last minute, so it’s not exactly his fault for reacting like this. Donghyuck had been surprised himself when they’d walked on set. The contract didn’t say anything about this. He was sure the company itself would avoid Maxim Ent like the plague moving on, honestly.

“Are you sure?”

Donghyuck stays where he is, watching Jaemin carefully, trying to laser stare into his brain to see if he was really okay with it, suddenly feeling guilty and uncertain over all. Jaemin smiles to himself, a little bitter. That might’ve been Donghyuck reading too much into it, though.

Jaemin finally stands up, making Donghyuck back away slightly as he stretches his arms over his head languidly. He’s in a white button-down shirt, one of the various outfits to fit the theme of the falling in love narrative. Donghyuck’s eyes briefly dip down to the slip of collarbone under the brush of collar before darting back up like a bungee spring. Jaemin isn’t looking at him, but he looks a lot more agreeable than a few minutes ago, after their chat. “I’m sure. Let’s go.”

Donghyuck huffs at Jaemin trying to rush _him_ now, but pats his charge on his lower back gently before slipping past him and leading the way back out to the set through the winding corridors. Jaemin follows him quietly, in his own thoughts apart from apologising to his team quietly. Donghyuck knows him well enough by now, like the back of his hand, to know he’s not completely fine with it, but he’s being reasonable at least. And that’s enough. 

*

It’s funny, because the only reason he was here (working at one of the biggest companies in the nation and at the side of one Na Jaemin) was purely because his father moonlighted as a CF/short director from time to time. 

His real job was professional video directing, but it worked out more beneficial for rookies and their companies to come to use his cheaper business more than not, because he took a lot of care right until the finished project. 

Donghyuck hated this shit, BTW.

It didn’t take long, with rude brushings off from idols his own goddamn age, to additional staff taking over all of the spots in his father’s studio he’s used to hiding in, for him to become well and truly disillusioned with the whole thing.

He does what his dad asks him to, though. Particularly for these clients, at least. His dad had taken him aside before they arrived on the balmy Saturday afternoon, and let him know the company that was coming was a subsidiary of someone _big_. Donghyuck had grinned, leaning a little in and teasing, _how big could they be if they were coming to you?_ This resulted in him getting pinched on the ear and sent out of the room.

When they entered, Donghyuck was mildly star struck for a moment, because he knew them. He’d read a couple articles about them when he had entertained becoming a trainee and doubling a life at SOPA, but those hopes were dashed a bit too quickly. They were SM’s group of revealed rookies, all young and unassuming and for once, a group of people that didn’t look like they wanted to spit on Donghyuck for existing around them.

One of them, young and small and a little shy, with a smile full of braces, waves at him from the side as they all step onto the set and Donghyuck swears, then and there, that he’ll die for the kid.

Donghyuck keeps himself busy and attentive, listening as his dad explains jovially the concept of what they’ll be filming today. They’d already been introduced as trainees, but they were sponsored by a specific general interior design brand from abroad. It’s more comedic than not, especially with the large box of props of the company’s making that Donghyuck delivers to their feet for them to choose. He bows slightly before scurrying back a little, and swiftly keeps up with every task his dad, and the lead of set production staff give him. 

It’s a pretty easy shift compared to the others, christened off with one of the managers approaching him with an inquisitive look on her face.

“Do you have a job for the summer?” 

And he needs something to do other than hang around with Jeno and his other friends over the sweltering months, something that hopefully includes AC and a decent pay packet, before his second year of university starts and when she tells him that it’s essentially what his dad asks him to do but for that fresh coin, he agrees immediately.

He does a lot of dumb shit that summer, and almost cries, at the least, three times. But he doesn’t hate it. He finds that this doubles as some sort of pre-general management training if he ever wanted to go into this sort of thing. Plus, with his experience working under his dad as on-location staff, when his manager recommends him for a program she went into at the beginning of her own career, he’s easily accepted.

It’s only when he finds out it’s mainly to become a manager of talent, does he realise that — well, maybe he’s a little in over his head.

*

Donghyuck pats Jaemin on his flank twice as he breaks off from him, the second tap being a small push in the direction of the middle of the filming set where the staff and his co-star have convened. Jaemin turns back, sticks his tongue out at his manager like a rude schoolboy before schooling his face into one of charm, his best smile.

He was good at that. The whole smiling thing. Made Donghyuck sick.

He sidles up next to where he sees someone he knows on the team, hovering on the edge of the room, tapping something hurriedly on his phone. 

Nakamoto Yuta was pretty much everything had Donghyuck wanted to be as a manager when he was learning the ropes and going through the guidance program. He’d gotten his own promotion recently, leaning more into the advertisement and aide side of things, rendering him lead point for this Innisfree/SM collaboration, which meant Donghyuck got to see him a lot more than usual. Never a bad thing, really. Yuta both teased and took care of him whenever their schedules overlapped, and that sort of easier relationship was hard to come by in this industry, especially with his seniors.

Yuta looks up with a blank face when Donghyuck nudges him, and when he realises who’s bothering him, a grin blooms across his face like a ripe flower. Donghyuck can’t help but cheese back, before turning to face the set as Jaemin speaks to the CF director with his hands clasped earnestly by his sternum. He’s sweet-talking him, as Jaemin manages to do each and every time a problem arises, mostly due to Jaemin being the problem himself. 

Sometimes it was hard being the manager of someone so fucking unruly. Na Jaemin was something like a firecracker, so brilliant and beautiful and born for greatness and Donghyuck couldn’t help but feel like a fizzle of spark next to him sometimes, especially when he felt Jaemin wriggle out of his metaphorical grip and trail blaze the sky on his own terms — but he didn’t mind. Not as much as he let on.

He watches as the older man’s face slowly warps from off-colour annoyance, to a little bit of ego-licked delight as Jaemin grovels, or charms, or flirts. 

Jaemin’s aptitude of captivating anyone and everyone around him, no matter how bratty he could slip into from time to time, was practically almost legend.

He doesn’t realise he’s staring at him, like, _really_ staring, until Yuta locks his Blackberry Curve with a point and leans down to murmur into Donghyuck’s ear.

“You’re all up in your head again, aren’t you?”

Donghyuck gulps at that, eyes darting away from Jaemin with a guilty swipe.

“No idea what you’re talking about, hyung.”

Yuta looks at him, something that probably isn’t pity but Donghyuck construes as such from the corner of his eye. The embarrassment, buried deep into the pit of his stomach, isn’t easy to ignore and burns at his lining.

“Just be careful, kid,” Yuta says, reaching out, before faltering and clasping a hand on his shoulder. It’s firm, and not quite so easy to shake off, so Donghyuck allows himself to keep it there. “If you listen to anything, just listen to that.”

(Donghyuck thinks back to the company dinner a few months ago, the one that was way too out of the way in Hoegi, because managing lead wanted a specific type of meat to grill and wouldn’t settle for any less. The taxi ride was long, because the subway had too many transfers, and Donghyuck had spent it crushed in-between to Yuta and Johnny, feeling out of sorts.

They’d ate, but more importantly they’d _drank_ , leaving Donghyuck feeling looser lipped and both at ease and unsettled at the same time. Somehow they’d migrated to the smoking area at the back of the barbecue joint, and Donghyuck stares at the little death stick before reaching out to Johnny quietly. Johnny himself doesn’t look happy about it, but at Yuta’s jostling, he takes one last drag before carefully brandishing it out for Donghyuck to take with his fingers.

“Careful, kid,” and really, Donghyuck is twenty-three years old by now. He could handle a little fire.

Turns out, he could not handle even the slightest fire. The metaphorical firemen had to be called, the fire was extinguished posthaste and also those weird little gel men in the Gaviscon adverts that freaked Donghyuck out as a kid, because he was getting heartburn something fierce all over a fucking _drag._

He splutters like an evil hag from a fairytale and his older friends laugh, and coo, and feed him beer, until he doesn’t feel as bad anymore, but somehow the feeling remains. Yuta and Johnny murmur to each other when Donghyuck falls silent, and Donghyuck draws his jacket around himself before opening his mouth again and finally touching on the thing that had been weighing down on him all evening.

“I think I might have feelings for Jaemin,” he says quietly. There’s only a few people out here including them, but they’re too far away, too wrapped up in their own conversation to overhear the words that are kind of like anvils in his coworker’s guts. They turn to face him, shock painted on their faces like a Banksy piece, and he continues on. “And I don’t know what to do about it.”

He’s only been thinking about this for a few weeks, now. Lingering touches, good morning kisses plastered on his cheek despite Donghyuck squawking in surprise each time that YOU’RE GONNA RUIN YOUR LIP TINT AND WE HAVE NO TIME FOR TOUCH-UP. Even Jaemin crushing himself to Donghyuck’s chest despite their height difference making it near impossible. That one moment a week ago he’s still convinced was a dream, entirely. Stuff he’s not allowed to think about in any capacity, lest it give him an aneurysm. Or make him lose his job.

Yuta and Johnny talk him down, a little good cop, rational cop concept that involves Johnny giving his wholehearted support to a Donghyuck in love and Yuta being a little nervous. He’s level-headed, which makes Donghyuck feel a little better about such a shit situation as falling in love, or whatever, and gives him the reality check he needs to stay steady after stomping out his stub of cigarette.

“He would do anything for you,” he starts, filling Donghyuck with a sick sort of joy and dread, his foot tapping against the flattened ash, “but I’m not sure you can give each other what you want.”)

They’re interrupted, thankfully, by the ring of the director instructing that filming will begin _again_ in five, and _can everyone find their places?_ Yuta grits his teeth in annoyance at being called away at such a key moment, and Donghyuck sends him a carefully balanced smile after their conversation and ushers him on and away. With a grimace, Yuta heads over to where the directing team are conversing prior to the shoot beginning, leaving Donghyuck alone with his thoughts.

In front of the production team, is the main filming area, marked by white tape and egregious amounts of plants. It’s a pretty set: very nature-filled, certainly to invoke the feel of green. Much like Jaemin’s outfit (delivered by the coordis in a transparent plastic bag, with #PURITY, #INNOCENT FEEL taped to the upper corner) his co-actress is in a similar style of blue jeans and a frilly, detailed white top.

His eyes trail back over to Jaemin, who’s tentatively conversing with his co-star now. She looks unimpressed, and Donghyuck bristles momentarily, almost on instinct at the way she’s looking down her nose at him. But he just smiles, tapered down a little but there enough, until she nods at him and the weird tension surrounding them seems to visually dissipate. Donghyuck’s own hackles lower, relieved it seems to be smoothed over and they take first positions, but he can’t help but feel a little uncomfortable for some reason. A reason he totally hasn’t buried under his left ventricle, and stuff.

Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all, he thinks.

He thinks, and yet the weird feeling pulling at his heart remains all throughout the first, second, third round of shootings when Jaemin’s hand finds Jihyun’s time and time again behind the camera lens.

*

The first team he actually manages, is a duo during the first six months of his career. This is all before he signed his life away to work under/for/beside Jaemin. It’s not a particularly major role, more pastoral care because he has to build himself up from the bottom, but the rest of the managing and stylist team treat him well, and their charges aren’t too bad, either. 

They debut a few months after Donghyuck joins the team. Immediate verdict is cute: a little too much like goldfish in a shark tank, wide-eyed and unassuming and fucking talented. CHENJI break national television with a KBS debut, and Chenle cries into Donghyuck’s shoulder the moment the stage is over. Jisung is a little more contained, unsure on where to go after being fussed over by three different people from staff, but when Donghyuck opens his other arm, the younger trails over and practically falls into him.

(His elbow knocks into Chenle’s side lightly, and the other complains back in a watery tone, and Donghyuck thinks tenderly that this has to be the job for him.) 

CHENJI don’t do well past third week album sales. 

They’re just too young, too underwhelming for a fickle public used to explosive stages and on trend tunes, especially from SM. They were a long-time coming primer for an endeavour between a Chinese company and their own, but they’d trained together, so even if they didn’t succeed, they still had each other. Donghyuck gets relegated to their off-time support staff (which essentially means goodbye) when their promotion cycle ends two weeks later, because they can’t afford to waste money on an extensive staff and managing teams if they weren’t instantly bringing in money. 

Donghyuck is bitter. He can’t help but feel shafted, when he’s told he no longer has to stay in their dorm, to help wake them up and accompany them to school, to broadcasting stations, to practice at the company building. He spends the weekend post-being told the news loitering around the backstreets of Namdaemun, trying to find a parting gift even though he doesn’t know if this is proper leaving protocol or not, scratching the back of his neck in front of countless stalls.

(He finds what he’s looking for, little chick and bear pendants for keychain making and scrambles something together. Passes them off as presents when he moves out of their dorm. Jisung cries, even though he’s not going anywhere, not really, and Donghyuck hugs them both tight.)

He gets pulled into the office a few days after he hears a few others are laid off. He’s nervous, unsure what they’ll do next — can’t fire him, he’s been relagated to trainee support, but what he’ll do now is confusing in itself, and —

“Donghyuck,” the senior management leader says in a dry tone, obvious in the fact they haven’t spoken much together. He seemed to be smiling though, so that was probably a good thing in the grand scheme of things. “Your work with CHENJI has been commended by multiple people. I’ve been hearing good things.”

“Well, sir,” he stammers, because he wasn’t expecting that, not really. “Thank you.”

“Promotions have ended for the boys now, and you’re off of active staff, correct? Meaning you’ll need something to do in the mean time.”

Donghyuck tried not to look more surprised than he was. 

“That’s right, sir.”

He stops pawing through the blue folder in his hands, tapping a picture Donghyuck can’t quite see. He puts it down on the table more into view, and Donghyuck feels a little bit of a dread seep into him when his eyes lock onto the upside-down portrait of a boy he knows all too well of.

“How would you feel if you were made part of the lead managing team for Jaemin?”

Fuck.

Not at the prospect of a new, full-time position. That was wonderful in itself. No, rather the fact that Jaemin, SM’s finest up-and-coming solo idol, is a complete and utter brat. 

The industry knows this, the vultures on the internet know this, and Donghyuck certainly knows this. Sure, his information mostly came from quiet exasperations over staff drinks, of petty Instiz articles that cut a little too deep.

Talented, incredibly so. But a complete and total brat.

Donghyuck had never come across him personally, though. Didn’t want to write him off entirely. So, with an overly enthusiastic smile, he agrees.

The first time Donghyuck is formally introduced to Jaemin, beyond seeing him at company events and that brief time they passed each other without a smudge of interaction in the underground parking of MBC, he’s an absolute dream. He’s calm, demure, exceedingly polite. There’s a suit in the room with them, higher ranked than the both of them, but his kind disposition doesn’t change when he leaves them to interact solo.

“I’m looking forward to working with you,” Jaemin had said, a little bashful and finally sticking out his hand. He’s in casual clothes, a face mask hooked under a pretty jaw, an even prettier smile on that pretty face. Donghyuck could see now, the beginnings of what exactly made him an idol. 

“Please take care of me.”

Donghyuck feels a little stifled in the suit he’s wearing with a folder clutched to his chest, wanting to be proper for his first meeting with his new charge, but Jaemin’s smile makes it all the worthwhile.

This lasts a total of one week.

He was appraised for the role because, whilst Jaemin had been an idol since he was eighteen, he had never had a manager close to his age. He’d been through three over two years, and Donghyuck joins him at the cusp of twenty. Jaemin’s true behaviour reveals itself quicker than Donghyuck suspects, little things any supporting staff not knowing something simple, or being giving the incorrect schedule or set list. Jaemin had sharp eyes, and a sharper tongue, but Donghyuck didn’t really let anything slide.

The first time he had called Jaemin out, Jaemin had looked up with his gaze full of vexation and little bit of wonder. Their relationship flourishes from then.

*

Jaemin is laughing to himself when he enters the van to shuttle him to the MBC recording studios two weeks later, which is a bit of a red flag in the first place. 

Not because he doesn’t laugh, far from it, sometimes he can’t get him to shut up, but it’s because the laugh isn’t directed at him or whatever living person or creature he charmed with a smile in the small trek from his apartment complex upper levels to the parking floor, but rather aimed toward his phone. He enters the front seat, even though the window blackout isn’t as strong in the passenger, and Donghyuck has told him countless times to stay in the back, all as usual.

“Good morning to you too,” Donghyuck starts, a little confused at this behaviour. Usually, early morning shoots leave him a little haggard and dry, but Jaemin looks fresh as anything. Also, he won’t look up from his damn phone.

“Oh, hey,” he says, looking up like he hadn’t realised Donghyuck was even there. It lit a fire in his throat he disguised as a cough at the dismissal because he thought they were _past_ this by now. Jaemin leans over then, singlehandedly stopping Donghyuck’s fury with a hand braced on the rest between them to press a fleeting kiss against Donghyuck’s cheek. He did it a lot, and Donghyuck was long past trying to put a professional barrier up between them, like he even wanted to these days. His fingers flex on the wheel as he pulls out of the parking complex of his apartment building.

“The Weekly Idol shoot will be around four hours today, let me know if you want me to pick up a drink or anything for the breaks,” he says. Jaemin distractedly answers a quiet _okay_ , still smiling at his phone, and Donghyuck seethes.

He doesn’t call him out until they reach that constant pool of traffic that makes slugging it over Banpo bridge a complete chore. Jaemin giggles to himself again, kind of looking up and at Donghyuck a couple times suspiciously and Donghyuck finally speaks up in a practiced kind of casual.

“Who’re you texting?”

“Jihyun,” he says back, a smile on his face as he doesn’t look up from his phone, almost making Donghyuck take a swerve into the wrong lane. The white glow of the screen makes Jaemin look unnervingly pretty against the shade of the bridge support beams, and the dim tint on the car windows, but he doesn’t think about that in favour of the weird revelation.

“As in Kang Jihyun? The girl you almost lost a CF deal for because you couldn’t deal with her?”

Donghyuck tries to control his voice, sound a little more sedated for a Wednesday morning but can’t quite tamp down on the disbelief. 

(The scandal of 2017, a year into Jaemin’s weirdly successful solo debut career and only a few months after Donghyuck joins them, hits them both like a truck. Nobody saw it coming. A revealed relationship between Idol A and Berry Love’s main vocal, Kyungwon, except it was just a low grade mosaic of someone so obviously Jaemin standing a little too close backstage for merely moment at some event, or other. It was a complete fabrication, an attempt to push Berry Love further into the limelight or notoriety — whatever it was, it brought traffic to articles, to music videos, to live broadcasts. Who cares if Jaemin’s career hung in the balance?)

“Yeah, well,” he starts, before lowering his phone into his lap a little. He looks sheepish, Donghyuck’ll give him that. “She’s nicer than I thought she would be. It’s hard finding people my age who are willing to like, call me out on my shit, I guess.”

 _Yeah,_ Donghyuck thinks, a reeling of bitterness hitting him like a tidal wave, _not like me, apparently._

“Just… be careful.”

“Weren’t you the one telling me to put my trust in her or something?”

“That was two weeks ago, genius. Didn’t know you’d fall in love, or whatever,” Donghyuck laughs a little derisively, igniting Jaemin’s spluttering as his mind suddenly works overtime to remember the little things about Jihyun. 

An actress under Maxim Entertainment, like the Berry Love girls. Had never been linked with anyone before, not even in the industry. Nice enough, polite. Greeted Donghyuck when he went to fetch Jaemin to film something for a following week’s festival during a break between the IF shoot, but definitely had that cool sort of aloofness that made it difficult for Donghyuck to get a read. 

She was more than her looks, that much was clear over how she’s captured Jaemin’s interest and kept it on a hook, but objectively? Gorgeous. Donghyuck knew very well how Jaemin’s downfall was something pretty. 

“You okay over there?” 

Jaemin’s voice cuts through his analytical thinking, over the slow buzz of whatever song is playing on the radio between them. Donghyuck gulps, looks back, hopes he wasn’t too obvious. Jaemin looks a little confused, eyebrows drawn in and phone face down on his lap now, and Donghyuck feels a little bit gratified at that at the least.

“Just thinking about the Dispatch shoot you have in a couple of days. You have a busy schedule the next few,” he mumbles back, eyes sliding back to the road as they finally get moving amongst the swell of cars, “sure you can keep up, big guy?”

Jaemin grins, all sharp like the way he does when he’s on stage, and curls a little more towards Donghyuck. His phone is completely forgotten now, vibrating every so often even though he usually leaves it on Do Not Disturb mode, which sails another flag in Donghyuck’s head even though he can’t help but feel a little pleased that Jaemin is looking at him, really looking for the first time this morning.

“You know me,” Jaemin drawls in a calm voice, reaching out and bracing a hand on the No Man’s Land between Donghyuck’s knee and the top of his thigh. Donghyuck gulps again, wills whatever feeling rising up his spine at the simple touch to be blown away by the car AC. “Endless reserves.”

“Oh yeah?” Donghyuck offers back like a returned tennis serve, praying his voice isn’t shaking. His fingers flex on the wheel again, as they change lanes.

He feels like his attention isn’t 100% on the road, some inch of it zeroed in like a laser beam on the way Jaemin’s big hands spread across the span of his thigh so easily; tip of his thumb worrying gently at the seam of Donghyuck’s jeans. It’s like he’s burrowing into his skin, even though that sounds like the least sexy thing possible on the scale of things. Donghyuck wasn’t a poet, okay, and his mind didn’t generate decent analogies when he was under pressure, so he let the weird thought pass with a quick scrunch of his eyes closed and open.

Jaemin hums like a hymnal note, staring into his manager’s side profile like an anchor has him hooked, and Donghyuck genuinely feels like he’s about to die. At least Jeno will take care of his cat, when he’s gone. Can’t give it to Jaemin: way too busy and thinks coffee is a meal replacement. Daffodil will be in good hands with Jeno. A little chaotic, but good. 

“Donghyuck,” Jaemin starts, leaning over the invisible wall that should separate the passenger and the driver from each other’s personal space and raising the warning alarm blaring through Donghyuck’s head. Or maybe that was his heartbeat, thudding 10-20-40 at whatever the fuck Jaemin was playing at, because he wanted to — desperately, but he couldn’t. “I want—“

“Jaemin, I can’t concentrate,” Donghyuck blurts, shifting his thigh so his knees press ramrod straight together. He regrets it immediately, regrets the warmth and the feeling his hand on him left behind as they both disappear immediately, even more so when he practically shuts Jaemin off like a switch. The younger boy backs off, quiet and embarrassed. From the corner of his eye, because Donghyuck doesn’t trust himself to look at that face and not fall into whatever trap lain, Jaemin looks hurt.

“Tell me — later,” he says instead with a little bit of urgency, before he can stop, because he’s a fool, knows this wouldn’t work but feels a misplaced sort of joy because Jaemin — in a capacity he’s not quite sure of — must feel the same, but he only shows a sign of listening by letting a scoff out of his mouth.

The car ride progresses in silence with Donghyuck’s nerves on red alert, the top ten digital chart of that month playing in the background filling out the blanks. That, and Jaemin’s thumbs tapping at the screen pointedly.

The Weekly Idol shooting goes well, filled out with a small mix of solo idols who’d recently promoted in the last month and a half. Jaemin is good, despite the fact he snaps a few times at his team out of sheer frustration when they nag him or urge him on. His short temperament didn’t show itself as often as it used to these days, especially when you compared his mood to the first few months of them working together, even more so pre-Donghyuck, but the manager couldn’t help but think their altercation earlier had spurred this on.

Surprisingly, the MCs swing the script well enough to make Jaemin’s Donghyuck-shaped bad mood disappear, and he breathes a sigh of relief. He flashes him a thumbs up mid-take when their eyes meet, despite the overhanging awkwardness between them and Jaemin’s shy smile back at him is slow but helps soften the nervous beat of Donghyuck’s heart.

*

The ‘overhanging awkwardness’ that Donghyuck has given a name, and therefore autonomy or some shit, doesn’t really disappear, more like stick to them like honey. 

Not the nice kind of honey, translucent and commercially clear, but like a pale sludge sticking to their fingers, and choking them every time they take a bite. Conversation comes hard regarding anything other than work, which is so different to how they usually are and leaves Donghyuck with a bitter feeling in his chest wondering how badly he messed this up. 

He felt it. Jaemin clearly felt… something, to some regard. He wished it were as simple as it could be, had a feeling if he called Johnny to whine about it he’d tell him _it_ is _that easy, Hyuck. Go get ‘em, tiger!_ Or something as equally supportive and fatherly. He kinda needed that, right about now. Almost let himself find Johnny’s contact and let his thumb hover over the call button, but his cat had taken that opportunity to leap gracefully from the floor to his chest from where he lied on the bed, promptly making him choke at the impact.

“Ugh, Daffy,” he had groaned, as she starts padding into his band t-shirt, nervously removing her pads so she didn’t accidentally tear it up, “always so smart.”

He locked his phone, cancelling the idea like a Sim’s character, instead choosing to pet her absently.

It didn’t make do to think about this. It’d all go away soon, he hoped, his feeling like an utter teenager again whenever he and Jaemin so much as looked at each other. 

(It doesn’t go away. Over the next few days it seemingly gets worse, Donghyuck utterly lovesick and Jaemin more interested in his phone than him, the only questionable contact between them Jaemin looking at him from time to time with a certain look in his eyes that Donghyuck can’t exactly place. What a joke.)

It’s the Dispatch shoot that finally breaks their Cold War standoff.

When they arrive at the venue, with the van filled with different staff from his mini team that Jaemin makes rumbling conversation with instead of Donghyuck like he’s so used to recently, they’re briefed by the director as the staff touching up the set in kind work around them. 

They’re kind of bustling around, brushing past Donghyuck but making sure they give Jaemin and the director of the shoot a wide berth. Donghyuck feels a little annoyed at being wrote off like this, but makes himself scarce after the scene directors step foot onto the playing field. It’s mostly a ploy borne from SM’s currently fantastic relationship with Dispatch, a way to boost Jaemin’s general public opinion and to drum up a bit more attention for his upcoming repackage album, so they had agreed to do it, sandwiched amongst Jaemin’s schedule of variety recordings and comeback prep.

The concept of the repackage is as cringeworthy as his first single, that feeling of first love and fighting for your true feelings or whatever. He’s dressed in a school uniform mixed with one of those embroidered school jackets, NA 813 emblazoned on the back with a pretty green illustration of a snake. He looks good, even though Donghyuck doesn’t want to admit it right about now, with his hair touched up to a cold brown. He watches quietly, nursing a half-full coffee as the shooting begins. 

It’s all very zoomed in, dark background, with a horde of lights and cameras to edit the photos in real time surrounding him, and he poses at the camera like it’s his most dedicated fan. The expressions are gorgeous to say the least, Donghyuck’s sentiment echoed as he hears other stuff surrounding him with quiet, pleased assents. 

_Come on, Donghyuck-ah_ , he thinks bitterly to himself, burying himself in his drink instead of letting himself fawn over Jaemin like everyone else in the damn room.

He finishes his drink quicker than expected and realises he can’t hide behind his cup anymore, pursing his lips. He lets his eyes drag from the stained ring at the bottom of the paper cup, almost about to link it to his love life (depressingly small), back to Jaemin — to find he’s already looking back at him, from where he remains at the centre of the room. 

All eyes were fixed on him, some form of him anyway, but Jaemin’s were on Donghyuck; keeping him trapped in his position like a vice. To the cameraman, to everyone else in the room it probably just looked like the idol was looking out of the corner of his eyes to the side, the kind of expression a teen who’s lifetime love is just out of reach on his face despite being twenty-two and out of high school for years, now. To Donghyuck, kind of stuck in his deer and headlights moment, in his heart he knew it was just a little more than that.

Donghyuck feels — he _feels_ , it’s all he can say, all he can really put together when Jaemin looks at him like that. He remembers the years that slowly erased the barriers of manager and idol and pencilled in the foundation of friendship, the one time tears had stained Donghyuck’s shoulder near the beginning of their relationship and the first thing they could joke about were local dry cleaning rates. He remembers the moment he scored his first number one trophy, with Jaemin running back stage after his encore and squeezing the ever-living hell out of Donghyuck to the point where he could scarcely breathe both out of joy and out of Jaemin’s weird, secret strength wringing the life out of him. 

He remembers collecting him from a drama shooting wrap company a few months ago, too far gone on flavoured alcohol and not much padding for his stomach other than some onion rings. He was all floppy, a nightmare to drag out with a mask on and his hood up, but even then he’d felt like a comfortable weight against Donghyuck. The way he’d left the party by exclaiming his departure to the room, then bowing as low as he could, bringing the cast and crew to simmers of laughter brought a smile to Donghyuck’s face, especially when the story was retold and retold countless times on television shows, on radio features. Jaemin’s golden heart shining through, despite others dismissal of his character.

There was one moment he didn’t talk about though, the one remaining untouched in his memory to the point he was convinced he’d dreamed the whole thing up, had been the trigger for Donghyuck’s feelings to reveal themselves. How he had walked forward, gently took Donghyuck’s hand clutching the cold water he’d fetched and turned him to cage him against his fridge. After however long it had taken for Donghyuck to corral him back, after he had tried to fetch him some cold water. 

Donghyuck had felt the dig of the Jeju fridge magnet he’d gifted Jaemin from his last visit, of picked up Shanghai charms from Jaemin’s work travels all littered around his fridge, all in his back as his charge kept him there. He wasn’t forcing him to stay, he could probably slipped away at any time, even, because he was definitely too far gone to mean any of this and that was the only way Donghyuck could rationalise it in his head.

Rationalise it he did well, but it didn’t quite quench that stinging feeling two steps left from his sternum that maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if they took a step forward in whatever dance they were duetting. 

Jaemin had a hand on the fridge door, promptly shutting it and keeping Donghyuck frozen in place, waiting like that one moment when you’re suspended midair on a swing set, waiting for the fall. A hand cupped Donghyuck’s neck, clumsy, thumb brushing the moles that were marked there. Jaemin looked pained, or at least that’s how Donghyuck made himself take it, and he waited for the blow. The blow of rejection, the blow of discomfort, something forceful and gut-wrenching to leave Donghyuck a little lost for the next few days before he can pack up this feeling into a laughably little box and ship it out of his fucking head.

“Donghyuck,” he starts with eyes shimmering with something, and even his name from his mouth invokes a heady feeling, but he knows it can’t last. He raises a tentative hand not clutching a water bottle to loosely grip Jaemin’s wrist to slowly guide him away, but doesn’t really make a move on it. Feels his heart beat both slow from the alcohol and fast for reasons he didn’t want to think about, and waits. Gauging him.

Nothing really happens, past that. Jaemin’s eyelids flutter, lips pursed like he’s trying to form the words, but the moment slips between them like leaves trailing past on the wind in every opening movie cinematic, and Jaemin ends up hunched over, resting his forehead against the curve of Donghyuck’s neck.

“Nope,” he says, sighs rather, all coming out in breath against Donghyuck’s skin and raising the hairs at the back of his neck in kind, “not brave enough.”

Jaemin’s tone is a sad, nose brushing against his collar and slumped against him like a miserable puppy. He can’t figure out what to focus on past those words, and even though he desperately wanted to sit him down and take them apart, he realised that today couldn’t be that day.

This day, months on, probably couldn’t be that day either — but it _could_ be a start.

Jaemin looks away when they ring for break, running over the first reel of photos. He doesn’t move from the stool but cranes his head to try and look at what they’d got so far, and that’s when Donghyuck finds a burst of confidence and finally moves. Leaving his empty coffee cup on the table where he rested against, he approaches Jaemin with a practised calm, and grins at the way Jaemin seems to blink a little rapidly at his advance.

“You’re not being a brat for once,” he says simply, moving to stand between his parted knees and mess with his hair a little. He could feel the stylists glaring a hole into his back, but it looks better to push off his head if only to watch it curl against his forehead like a spring. “Kinda impressed, here.”

“I mean, uh,” Jaemin starts, eyes wide and staring up at Donghyuck like a cagey animal, “isn’t that what you like?”

“When you’re not causing trouble? Love it, can’t get enough,” he snorts, brushing off his jacket shoulders for invisible pieces of lint and looking anywhere big his face. Distantly, Donghyuck registers some more lens shuttering noises and looks over his shoulder to see where it was coming from. Jaemin looks up at him, neck craned and awkward from where he was practically staring up at his manager with something Donghyuck wanted to read as hope. His fists tie into the bottom of his hoodie, tugging his manager’s attention back to him. 

“I want to talk,” Donghyuck mutters, so only they can hear it with the words between them, “and I’m sorry for dismissing you the other day and we _can_ … talk, that is, later. Just let me know when you’re ready.”

Jaemin is a little speechless but ends up nodding, earnestly, letting a shy smile spread across his face and it makes Donghyuck’s heart beat just that little faster to see, like the absolute traitor it was. Donghyuck pulls away, heading back to the ring of staff as shooting begins again and Jaemin begins posing again with a renewed sort of vigour.

“Hey,” he hears a high voice, and dreads suddenly that someone _had_ overheard them even though he hadn’t said anything particularly incriminating, had seen something off. He turns, eyebrows a little draw in, to find a Dispatch staff’s pleasant face. “Look, these are kind of nice.”

Donghyuck swallows an uncomfortable lump in his throat, leans over to look at her DSLR’s preview screen, obscured only when her thumb swipes across it. The photos were… sweet, for what they were. Unposed, a little quivery in quality from where she’d clearly last minute decided to take their photo. The first few, Donghyuck’s expression is hidden, but Jaemin is staring up at him in some degree of earnest wonder and it doesn’t help the feeling swimming around in his chest like a loose sea creature.

There aren’t that many to scan through and by the end of the reel, Donghyuck thanks her with what he hoped was some amalgamation of kind and charming.

“Hey, they _are_ pretty good,” he replies, grinning all swift and brushing something invisible off of himself to give his hands something to do. He thanks her again, and she smiles, before being called away. He finds himself settled after that little exchange, back to watching Jaemin work his magic with a renewed sense of something good.

*

When Donghyuck gets the email chime notification from where he’s writing up his monthly report after hours a few days later, slumped in an awkward but familiar position against the wall that will serve his spine nothing but years of chronic pain, he doesn’t look at it immediately. 

The report is overwhelmingly positive for once, and kind of lost himself in compiling all the verbal praise Jaemin had received per schedule. He was biased, at this point, had been biased for a while now, but he couldn’t help it. Probably exploiting his role as manager, though.

When he forcefully pressed the enter key to start a new paragraph, he lets his eyes wander to the sticky notification at the bottom right of his screen, telling him he had an email from Dispatch.

Giving up for a second, he dragged the mouse over and double-clicked even though he didn’t need through through force of habit. The window swallows the screen, and his eyes dart to find the text.

 _Good evening, I hope these images find you well,_ the email had started, and Donghyuck distantly scrolled through the previews of the attachments, _this is just a back-up set of the chosen images for the release later on. Please forward to the supporting staff and share with Jaemin as you see fit._

He saves the whole file, opening it up embarrassingly quickly and ignores Daffodil’s rambling _mrrow_ at being disturbed from beside him a little. He flows through them quickly, and is even pleased to see the B-cut photos squashed near the end, the ones of Jaemin grinning at the staff and even better, the ones of the two of them in the middle of their deep conversation. That kind of made Donghyuck melt in a little bit of embarrassment, though. Days had passed, and they hadn’t talked about whatever was going on between them.

It’s not like they hadn’t been talking — far from it, really. Conversation flowed easier than it had in weeks, and it seemed like they were back in a good place. It did mean though they were at a sort of crossroads. After Donghyuck had apologised and told him to come to him whenever he was ready with actually discussing _it,_ whatever it was, it just meant playing some kind of waiting game. 

Which, he was totally fine with. Duh. Not like he put himself out on a line at all. And to be fair, this was all new to Jaemin too, if he even felt the same way. There was that possibility, that small possibility that he didn’t feel the same as Donghyuck — not really, too drunk with their proximity to realise his feelings weren’t real. And he’d have to be okay with that outcome, if it came to bloom.

But it was a selfish sort of nice to look at these photos, entertain some sort of reality in which Jaemin looked at him like this and meant it, really meant it, in the way that Donghyuck was realising he did. The guy he spent his early twenties with, helped grow from a complete brat to like, the nation’s idol. It was sentimental and Donghyuck was ready to bury his face in his pillow and yell at the feeling, but he couldn’t deny it — it felt good.

He’s interrupted, then, by his phone ringing from where it digs into the crease of his knee. His caller-tone is Jaemin’s debut song that consisted of terribly cheesy, let-me-be-your-boyfriend style of pop that Jaemin secretly loathed — and therefore, Donghyuck adored. He’s seen Jaemin scrunch his face any time he realises it’s in his performance line-up for festivals, and that makes it all the better.

 _you’re sweet, s-s-s-sweet, good enough to eat,_ comes Jaemin’s tinny voice from the speaker, _why oh why can’t you be my treat?_

Donghyuck digs his phone out and swipes before he can see who it is, greeting politely in case it was someone at the office.

“Hey, Lee Donghyuck,” comes a familiar voice, making a smile curl across Donghyuck’s mouth, “are you home? I need to talk to you.”

“You remember the passcode right?” Donghyuck laughs back, a little skittishly at that, suddenly excited at the prospect of the two of them being at the end of the line because if they didn’t talk tonight, he knew they’d never breach the subject.

“Of course I do,” Jaemin snorts loudly, and Donghyuck hears the obnoxious tones of the key code chiming in the background. “What do you take me for? By the way, where are you? I’ll streamline right there.”

“In my room,” he lets him know, ignoring his weird word choice and quitting the call when he hears the main door open. He looks down at himself, an oversized dark shirt he usually uses for lazing around or pajamas sticking out to him and making embarrassment flood his system that he wasn’t in slightly nicer clothes. Not like Jaemin hadn’t seen this before, hadn’t seen him at his worst even, but somehow for something like this…

The thoughts disappear when Jaemin enters. He’s got his hood over his head, strings drawn to the edges with tufts or brown hair peeking through the edges from underneath. Donghyuck recognises it as one of Jaemin’s old ones, kinda oversized to where it gives him sweater paws no matter what he did, and there’s smudges of eye makeup from where the hoodie ring squishes his face.

“Did you have fun, earlier?” Donghyuck asks, willing himself up and pushing his laptop to the side. The fact he was home this early from where Donghyuck had dropped him off, an Innisfree mixer with various staff and brand face’s of past and present surprised him, however. “How’d you even get home, by the way? I told you to call me when you’re done, idiot.”

“Yeah,” Jaemin cheeses, before scrabbling his fingers at the knot of his drawstrings to let his hood down. His cheeks were red, face flushed from the alcohol he assumed Jaemin had necked. He schools his expression which was just… cute, like everything about him. Disgusting. “And I got home with Jihyun’s manager, but that’s not the point of why I’m here. This is important, alright? Make sure you’re paying attention.”

“Consider my attention hooked,” Donghyuck drawls back, smile widening a bit when Jaemin sends an ever so extravagant Jaemin-esque pout his way. He looks down, shoving his hands half under his thighs and knotting them in the sheets to keep them occupied, and only looks up when there’s a finger shoved in his up close and personal vicinity almost touching his nose.

Jaemin’s hair is tousled, finger just remaining in front of Donghyuck’s face and making him stare up with drawn in eyebrows. 

“I’m confessing properly, if I’m gonna do this at all.”

A thrill runs through Donghyuck, like he’s been hit with lightning and Jaemin’s words are a soothing balm. He doesn’t vocalise this, was probably never going to because it was overly soppy and embarrassing, but ultimately because Jaemin gets distracted by Donghyuck’s still-open laptop screen. A sweet picture of the two of them is on the screen, and Donghyuck — after tracking the other boy’s gaze — scrambles to shut the lid. It’s too late though, Jaemin’s seen it, is suddenly grinning so brilliant and now more on top of this situation than Donghyuck ever was.

He sits next to Donghyuck, their knees touching as Jaemin reaches over to gently open the lid by holding his manager’s wrist, fingers splayed to map our Donghyuck’s hand. He lets him do it, if only to indulge of Jaemin’s hand on his, but blanches all the same in embarrassment at what’s on the screen.

“I didn’t see these,” Jaemin murmurs, that same grin on his face somehow not fading. Didn’t he get muscle ache? Like, really. “You should’ve shown me.”

“Only got ‘em just now,” Donghyuck offers back, a little weakly. 

Jaemin somehow defies all logic and smiles harder, to the point where he covers his face with both of his hands to will it away. Donghyuck huffs at that, reaching up to pull his hands away with a soft firmness. His hands curl around Jaemin’s almost binary arms, lean-muscled forearms with thin wrists. Donghyuck curls a hand around the two, tugs. He’s too aware how close they are, how this isn’t anything new but they’re in new territory now. Unmapped, going in completely blind. There are butterflies in Donghyuck’s stomach, for fuck’s sake.

“Donghyuuuck,” he whines, and suddenly they’re not manager and idol, but friends who spent after work hours squished from shoulder to hip on the cough streaming shitty horror movies on Netflix, clutching at each other like mad, who went to the apartment Jaemin had bought his parents for dinners with them time after time, had been by each other’s side — long enough to come to terms with whatever stupid feelings he harboured in his stupid chest.

“What’s the matter?” He asks back, taking the chance of brushing his thumb across the smooth of his forearm, and watching as Jaemin tilts his head toward him.

“Donghyuck, I think I’m in love with you,” he says, like he’s exhaling it all in one breath, a little pinch between his eyebrows making his eyes look kind of sad, “and I’m sorry for making it weird between us, and I understand if you don’t like me back but you’re driving me crazy and it’s—”

Donghyuck covers his mouth then, hand squishing against his lips sort of frozen in that pouty way he speaks and leaving him to blink rapidly and owlishly. 

“You really think I don’t like you back? You think I’m not head over heels, stupid?”

He finds the words come easy with that smooth burst of dopamine to hear those kinds of words. That he loved him. Twenty three, and he still wanted to squeal into his pillow like a lovesick school girl.

Jaemin’s eyebrows almost scale into his hairline.

“ _Sshheriously?”_

Donghyuck removed his hand, wiping it on Jaemin’s shoulder and laughing out heartily at the other boy’s squawk at the action.

“Against my best interests,” he sighed, all put on. He’s over dramatic, looking away with his nose turned up, and continues on. “Can’t believe I’m in love with this loser. What ever is a boy like me to do—“

Jaemin leans forward then, essentially cutting the conversation short. He reaches up with a tentative hand, Donghyuck’s slipping off in turn and fisting the loose material of his sweats; eyes trying to focus when Jaemin’s hand lightly brushes against the side of his face, tilting it towards him. Donghyuck goes, easier than he expects, watching as Jaemin’s eyes dip down to his mouth and back up again like elastic. Donghyuck swallows.

When Jaemin finally kisses him, that last little bit of tension seems to melt away. 

It’s awkward at first: Jaemin a little shy and Donghyuck slow on the uptake, but when he turns his head that smidgen and slides a hand up to cup the back of Jaemin’s neck he finds its easier to lose himself in the feeling of Jaemin’s mouth on his—finally, after however many months of secretly wanting this. Jaemin is spurred on at the slow brush of Donghyuck’s fingertips at his hairline but backs away if only to give them a chance to breathe and correct his position to further on the bed, and kisses him again. He’s a little further away now, so Donghyuck has to move a little closer so he’s more in Jaemin’s general area, and snorts out an embarrassing laugh that the other boy mirrors with a grin against his mouth.

“I can mitigate the risks, by the way,” Jaemin says, punctuating it with another light and quick kiss that leaves Donghyuck’s pursed, eyes fluttering, “‘cos I have it all planned out.”

“Oh yeah, smart guy?” 

“I have a presentation if you find it within yourself wanting to see it,” Jaemin says, one hand finding its place his waist, “please don’t actually ask to see it. I didn’t update my cloud so I can’t actually access it on my phone but I _do_ have notes on my pho—“

Donghyuck doesn’t let him finish, surging forward and kissing him again, if only to stifle the carefree laugh threatening to bubble up and over once more. His mouth moves against Jaemin’s more easy now, hand cupped against his face to keep him close; ends up clambering into his lap with Jaemin’s hands around his waist. Hands turn into every inch of his arms wrapping around him, holding him close as Donghyuck licks into his mouth slowly and smoothly and with an unlocked ease he didn’t know he possessed. No, more like never knew he would have the chance to use. Not with Jaemin, and not like this. Their hips slot together as well as they can’t from this position, and Donghyuck lets out a quiet hiss at the feeling, teeth worrying at Jaemin’s lip sparingly; a slow drag punctuating every kiss.

Jaemin meets him well, Donghyuck keeping him in place with both of his hands cupping Jaemin’s cheeks. He plans to kiss him silly, and the soft rise and fall of the younger boy’s chest against his has him feeling love drunk.

When Jaemin finally pulls back, there’s a dozy smile stretched across his face in million watt white. The sight makes Donghyuck’s heart clench.

There’s a nice stretch in his thighs where he’s straddling Jaemin, but he ignores it in favour of having to ask a serious question. 

“Are you sure?” He asks, willing his voice to stay steady. “About this, I mean. Like… wouldn’t Jihyun be a better choice?”

It pained him to say it, and probably made even less sense after he’d kissed him like that, but he was right. At least with those two their meeting story made sense, it could be controlled but he’d be free to do whatever he wanted, if he was with her. 

Jaemin scrunches his face up at that, confusing Donghyuck entirely.

“Why would I want to date Jihyun?”

Donghyuck feels the butterflies erupt in his stomach at the thought of dating Jaemin, but he internally wills them to settle down.

“What do you mean? Weren’t you two…?” Donghyuck trails off in a puzzled tone, hands sliding from Jaemin’s cheeks to his shoulders, a small part of him still registering his arms around his waist.

“Me? And Jihyun?” Jaemin asks, and there’s a few beats of silence until Jaemin fucking _chortles_ out laughing. Donghyuck quickly smacks him lightly to shut him up, considering it was late and the apartment complex walls were weirdly thin. “Oi, Lee Donghyuck.”

Donghyuck arches back a smidgen in surprise, but Jaemin’s grip keeps him from going too far. 

“I have never felt more sure about anything in my life. It’s you,” and that makes another flutter go through Donghyuck’s chest. At this point, he’s gonna have to go in for a biopsy because the butterflies loose in him were wreaking havoc. 

“Also,” he continues, shaking his head, “any time I was talking to Jihyun it was her lecturing me on having confidence or pretty much complaining about how oblivious you are. It’s unbelievable, by the way.”

“I’m not oblivious, though?” Donghyuck’s voice cracks at that, and he wilts, curls into Jaemin’s body with his forehead resting against his shoulder. The position invokes such a feeling of déjà vu, of Jaemin’s failed confession months ago. “Just… didn’t know what to think.”

“Didn’t think it was real?”

He can hear the smirk in Jaemin’s voice, and pinches at his side. “You want me to tell you I thought it was a dream?” 

Donghyuck mumbles into the front of Jaemin’s hoodie material, a little snarky, but goes easily when Jaemin guides his head back up; nose tips brushing when he kisses him softly.

“You wanna do this? Like, really?” Jaemin mumbles between kisses, but he looks up earnestly, with those massive puppy dog eyes that let him get away with too much. “I don’t want to stress you more…”

Donghyuck reaches up between them and takes hold of his chin lightly, squishing his cheeks between his thumb and forefinger, making him pout again and enjoying how pliable he was at times. 

“It’s you, isn’t it?” 

When Jaemin surges forward once more to kiss him, Donghyuck meets him on the way, sure to disturb his neighbours as he laughs loudly at how eager Jaemin was, falling back onto the bed, the younger boy covering him easily.

The spend an obnoxious amount of time like that, Jaemin being ridiculously obsessive to the point of kissing every inch of Donghyuck’s face and making the slightly older boy bark out laughter and struggle away. But the happy feeling in his chest is constricting in the best way, and that’s all that matters, especially when Jaemin crumbles himself against Donghyuck’s chest again and mumbles about all that excitement deserved a nap.

“Yeah, that’s fine and all, but I need to use the laptop so—Jaemin. Jaemin? You’re joking m—can you please wake up, or I’m gonna lose my job twice as hard here.”

Jaemin snores in response, and Donghyuck’s head from where it’s craning up to look at him slams back into the pillow, fighting back an endeared smile.


End file.
